HOPE Christian High School has set an excellent example of education that is making a significant difference in the lives of Milwaukee’s young men and women.

For the second consecutive year, 100 percent of HOPE’s three-dozen graduating seniors have been accepted to a four-year college or university. The school is located in the Harambee neighborhood on Dr. Martin Luther King Drive.

“At HOPE, college is not a dream, it’s a reality,” said senior Teaomnmi Wright.

“Before I went to HOPE, I hadn’t planned to go to college,” Wright said. “Now, being the first in my family to graduate from college is a main priority of mine. I have to do it so that I can set an example for everyone who looks up to me.”

Students at HOPE say they have found a different sort of peer pressure than many high schools offer.

“At our school, it’s cool to get good grades and to want to go to college,” senior Taylor Brown said. “We work hard, and we encourage each other to do our best.”

The Department of Public Instruction reports that only about 60 percent of Wisconsin seniors take the ACT, a standardized test for college admissions, but that is not the picture at HOPE. Here, all of the seniors took the test, and photos of the 2013 seniors holding college acceptance letters literally cover an entire “Wall of Acceptance” outside the main office.

“These young men and women from HOPE High are proving what is possible for students,” said Patricia Pattillo, publisher of the Milwaukee Community Journal. “We couldn’t be more proud of them and their accomplishments.”

HOPE plans to celebrate the achievements of their senior scholars with a special “Signing Day” assembly on Friday, May 31. Similar to the concept of Signing Day for athletes, HOPE seniors will undergo a rite of passage when they announce where they have chosen to attend college in front of their families, schoolmates, faculty and community supporters.

“We are hosting this event to surround our seniors with love and support as they prepare to head to college in the fall,” said Principal Zach Verriden. “As a team and family, we also want to reinforce with our younger students that college is the expectation, not the exception.”

HOPE Christian High School is part of HOPE Christian Schools, a network of four schools serving more than 1,200 students in four-year-old kindergarten through 12th grade on Milwaukee’s North Side. Nearly 100 percent of HOPE students participate in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program.

HOPE students typically come from low-income families, and most students arrive at school at least two grades behind, according to school administrators.

“Those statistics are just a number,” Verriden said. “They do not define our students. HOPE seniors will leave here empowered with the knowledge, skills and character necessary to succeed in college and to become inspirations for their families, leaders in the community and successes in the workplace.”

Hope Christian High School Wall of Acceptance

HOPE Christian High School seniors from the class of 2013 have been accepted to nearly 70 colleges and universities, and they have amassed more than $1 million in scholarships and grants. Below is a list of colleges to which members of the class of 2013 have been accepted.

The Sisters in Faith Holy Bible: Encouraging and Empowering African- American Women with God’s Truth is expected to address the concerns of today’s Christian women who are seeking God’s wisdom and guidance in every area of their busy and complex lives, says Elev8.com.

This special Bible is now available in stores and online.

This beautifully designed Bible will have a unique African-American perspective, thanks to executive editors Michele Clark Jenkins and Stephanie Perry Moore. Michele and Stephanie are the co-founders of Sisters in Faith, an entity established to create meaningful products that encourage and empower African-American women with God’s truth, and address the needs and concerns of life that are particularly challenging to the women in this culture.

Church Women United (CWU) Milwaukee Unit, held a Life Membership Recognition Day as part of its April general meeting recently at Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church, 2207 N. 2nd St. Approximately 169 Christian women from 16 area churches of various denominations were recognized for their contributions to their faith, church and community. CWU is a national ecumenical movement of Christian women witnessing to unity and faith in Jesus Christ through worship, study, action and celebration. CWU celebrates the diversity that enriches the faith community by rejoicing in their oneness of Christ, which transcends differences and empowers Christians to work together for a society of peace and justice. The CWU Milwaukee unit was founded in 1921 as a channel through which Christian women might serve the community in endeavors no single denomination could undertake alone. (Photo by Yvonne Kemp)

As she parses the details of being HIV-positive, Eva Fields, 37, lays out some essential facts: Her infection is a notable marker of her personal health but not a source of incapacitating shame.

She has never hidden the regrettable truth of how she contracted HIV—through unprotected sex with a man, now dead from AIDS-related causes—least of all from the three children she has mainly single-parented and the doting husband she married a year ago.

“I had to take the initiative to better understand what it meant to have HIV. Once I did that, the stigma … went away for me,” Fields told The Grio. “There was never any doubt in my mind that I could overcome this.”

The real faces speak

In a video highlighting the nationwide Empowered/Greater Than AIDS campaign, a Kaiser Family Foundation project that launched today, Fields, of Roswell, Ga., shares with four other HIV-positive women her sentiment and assorted details of what has transpired since her 1994 HIV diagnosis.

Like Fields, they are attaching to that campaign—whose much prominent public spokesperson is singer-activist Alicia Keys, also appearing in the video—their names, faces and real-life tales of how they are thriving in an era when HIV/AIDS is far from the automatic death sentence it seemed, years ago, to have been.

Alongside Keys, the five HIV-infected women, as grassroots campaigners, are assisting Empowered’s multi-pronged bid to hammer home to the broad public that HIV/AIDS treatments are more effective than ever.

What would help change that for black women and everyone else, said Empowered’s Dr. Lisa Fitzpatrick, a public health researcher who also treats HIV/AIDS patients, is including HIV/AIDS in the kind of routine, blood-sampled screenings used to detect, say, diabetes, or other disease. For now, HIV/AIDS tests, which cost roughly $20, must be specifically requested. For women with health insurance, the tests also are now free through a provision of Obamacare that went into effect last year.

“Make sure that everybody you know knows what’s available to them,” said White House Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett, during today’s press briefing to launch Empowered.

Heightening awareness of that provision among women is only one aspect of the screening issue.

“We have to make this more palatable so that health-care providers see that this is a manageable, chronic disease and do this screening along with other tests,” epidemiologist Fitzpatrick, director of the Center of Excellence for Infectious Diseases at United Medical Center in Washington, D.C., told The Grio.

Routine screening also would help de-stigmatize HIV/AIDS, which some still see as a kind of punishment for misbehaving, said Fitzpatrick, also a member of the AIDS Commission in Washington, D.C., which provides free anti-retroviral drugs to HIV/AIDS patients who are uninsured or cannot afford them.

Routine screening, as a standard of health care, also seems especially critical, public health researchers and advocates, grassroots activists and physicians contend, at a time when government and philanthropic funding for HIV/AIDS programs has diminished; and when programs that do qualify for funding face stricter requirements to empirically prove that their work is achieving the desired results.

Atlanta Harm Reduction’s needle exchange program, for example, has been viewed as a model of effectiveness—in a state where such exchanges are illegal, but law enforcement agencies, nevertheless, have arrested no one in connection with that endeavor.

Still, the organization’s $50,000 operating budget for the current fiscal year allows for far less programming than did the $150,000 2012 budget. The nonprofit now functions as a team of two with the help of volunteers.

Those who help struggle to stay afloat

While the bulk of the Atlanta project’s clients are men, women—including mothers who prostitute themselves because their nominal job skills keep them out of the legal job market—also are in those ranks.

Funding shortfalls, even if temporary, “are going to mean is that we will have to look at our strategy for reaching certain black women differently … We’re going to have to look at how we [medically] treat those who are HIV-positive, how we link and keep them in care and, then, have them become ambassadors to promote testing and prevention within their own social networks,” said Leisha McKinley-Beach, director of technical assistance and stakeholder engagement at the Los Angeles-based Black AIDS Institute.

While the Institute, another Empowered partner, has conducted no comprehensive survey, the California nonprofit has seen roughly a half-dozen HIV/AIDS projects that it has counseled fold recently, mainly due to decreased funding and the new qualifying standards demanded by government and private funders.

Meanwhile, the Institute has been counseling Atlanta Harm Reduction on how to expand its funding prospects and revamp programming in a manner that builds upon and retains the best of its services, which, in addition to the needle exchange, have incorporated job training and training in safe sex practices, including on how to insist that a male partner wear a condom.

Those are among the necessary “wrap-around’ services addressing the difficulties that do attend the lives of some with HIV/AIDS.

Some progress, not enough

Poverty, homelessness, personal denial and, in some cases, mental illness disproportionately plague the teen-age to 70-something female HIV/AIDS patients that Dr. Monika Daftary sees at Howard University, the first hospital in the country to adopt a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention-suggested rapid HIV screening effort.

“We still have kids who get diagnosed and whose parents kick them out of the house … It’s hard for someone to take anti-retrovirals every day if they’re hearing voices,” pharmacology professor Daftary, a clinician and researcher focusing on HIV-AIDS therapies, told the audience at a health disparities conference last month in Washington, D.C. “If we can’t keep folks engaged, it’s like a cat chasing its tail. We’re never going to be able to fix this.”

Indeed, only a quarter of the 1.1 million Americans diagnosed with HIV—one in four of them are woman of every racial stripe—is taking drugs designed to keep their biomedical markers from falling to levels that indicate they have what has been conventionally defined as AIDS. Those who do maintain their treatment regimens reduce their chances of infecting others with HIV by 96 percent, with that study based on information that those with HIV self-reported.

“We know that antiretroviral therapy for HIV-positive individuals not only improves health and extends life for that individual,” said Dr. Risha Irvin, a senior advisor in Kaiser’s Health Communication & Media Partnerships Program. “But we also know that the initiation of antiretroviral therapy … substantially protected their HIV-negative sexual partners.”

Worldwide, fewer people are contracting and/or dying from HIV/AIDS, with that trend holding true in the United States. That black Americans still are disproportionately counted among those who are HIV-infected is partly due to the fear many blacks harbor about the pandemic and the failure of many blacks to have a candid discussion about the risks, observers said.

Those lapses reflect misplaced fear, confusion, “rage and anger,” said Stephanie Brown, 26, an HIV-positive performance artist-HIV/AIDS activist from Fayetteville, N.C., who is one of the five spotlighted, grassroots Empowered spokespeople.

“After I [eventually] was comfortable accepting the fact that is what is and that I was living with this virus, I started talking about it,” Brown told listeners at that Washington health disparities conference. “And when I went to tell my story in prison, these men, they could be murderers, rapists … wouldn’t even come in the room with me when they found out my diagnosis … Thirty years [after the first AIDS diagnosis] and people act like this is still brand new.”

Or, as Eva Fields put it: “We can be afraid of the unknown. But, for me, this work is personal. I’m helping to put a face on it … and broaden the avenues” of discussion, awareness and prevention.

Keys, who began championing the anti-AIDS fight during a 2001 trip to Africa and co-founded Keep a Child Alive, said during today’s launch: “Knowledge is the best way to overcome ignorance and fear. Courage is the best way to overcome stigma and shame.”

The idea that thinning hair is a guy problem is simply wrong. Forty percent of people who experience temporary or long term hair loss are women. Some have hair that is thinning all over, while others see the center part gradually widen. Still others develop distinct baldness at the crown of the head. Unlike men, women rarely develop a receding front hairline.

The average scalp has 100,000 hairs. Each follicle produces a single hair that grows at a rate of half an inch per month. After growing for two to six years, hair rests awhile before falling out. It’s soon replaced with a new hair, and the cycle begins again. At any given time, 85% of hair is growing, and the remainder is resting.

So what are some common reasons for hair loss in women?

Thyroid Problems

The thyroid is a butterfly-shaped gland at the front of the neck. It produces hormones that regulate many processes throughout the body. If the gland makes too much or too little thyroid hormone, the hair growth cycle may falter. But hair loss is rarely the only sign of a thyroid problem. Other symptoms include weight gain or loss, sensitivity to cold or heat, and changes in heart rate.

Polycystic Ovary Syndrome

Women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) have a chronic hormonal imbalance. The body makes higher levels of androgens than expected. This often causes extra hair to sprout on the face and body, while hair on the scalp grows thinner. PCOS can also lead to ovulation problems, acne, and weight gain. But sometimes thinning hair is the only obvious sign.

Alopecia Areata

Alopecia areata causes hair to fall out in startling patches. The culprit is the body’s own immune system, which mistakenly attacks healthy hair follicles. In most cases, the damage is not permanent. The missing patches usually grow back in six months to a year. In rare cases, people may lose all of the hair on their scalp and body.

Childbirth

Some women may notice their hair seems fuller during pregnancy. That’s thanks to high levels of hormones that keep resting hairs from falling out as they normally would. But it doesn’t last forever. After childbirth, when hormone levels return to normal, those strands fall out quickly. This can mean a surprising amount of hair loss at one time. It may take up to two years for hair to return to normal.

The Pill

A little known side effect of birth control pills is the potential for hair loss. The hormones that suppress ovulation can cause hair to thin in some women, particularly those with a family history of hair loss. Sometimes hair loss begins when you stop taking the pill. Other drugs linked to hair loss include blood thinners and medicines that treat high blood pressure, heart disease, arthritis, and depression.

Tight Hairstyles

It’s no myth: Wearing cornrows or tight ponytails can irritate the scalp and cause hair to fall out. The same is true of using tight rollers. Let your hair down, and it should grow back normally. Be aware that long-term use of these styles can cause scarring of the scalp and permanent hair loss.

A very interesting thing happens when women leave the room. Men talk. An intriguing video series from Madame Noire entitled “Gentlemen Uncensored” captures the views, opinions and observations of today’s African-American man.

(Mybrotha.COM) — One of the biggest differences between men and women is how we communicate and what we communicate about. It is widely known that women usually talk about their feelings more often than men. This is especially true when a woman asks a man to express himself.But what happens when women leave the room? How open and honest will men be amongst themselves, and what exactly do they talk about?An intriguing video series entitled “Gentlemen Uncensored” by Madame Noire, highlights the views, opinions and observations of today’s African-American man. The series observes real guys talking about marriage, cheating, monogamy, sex, and more.

In order to foster an engaging environment where men can openly express their loves, joys and fears, no women were present. This, along with a few men who had something to say, created a lively discussion about everything from marriage, to fatherhood.

According to Dr. J.R. Bruns, a psychiatrist and medical director of La Mer Integrative & Behavioral Medical Group, there is a good reason why black men in America wonder whether or not they should even bother with marriage.

“Men and women are misconnecting like never before and punitive and antiquainted divorce and custody laws are like gasoline to a inferno,” Bruns said in a November 2012 Psychology Today article.

“This new alienation has exacerbated since 1965 when Daniel Patrick Moynihan first alerted America of the coming destruction of the black family unit. Moynihan was harshly criticized at the time for his startling warning to a sleeping nation. But now for all ethnic groups in America, marriage and parenthood have split apart. Now that the national rate of childbirth out of wedlock is approaching double the rate for blacks in 1965 that so alarmed the Johnson Administration, it is a fair question to ask why any men should get married.”

To kick things off for Madame Noire’s Gentlemen Uncensored series, Chris Kazi Rolle, appropriately labeled “The Convo Starter,” started a discussion by asking his boys if they would get married, why they would get married, and what it would take for them to pop the question and walk down the aisle?

After catching an afternoon showing of Tyler Perry’s Temptation on its opening day, I left the movie completely annoyed.

I wasn’t just annoyed by the sophomoric dialogue, or the highly-predictable-yet-highly-improbable plot.

And I wasn’t just annoyed by the poor editing and overwrought melodrama (though all of those things gave me plenty to be annoyed by).

What sent me over the edge was the heavy-handed punishment of a female character who happened to be interested in sex, and the implication that the rest of her days on Earth were doomed to loneliness and regret. Oh. And HIV.

Warning: Major movie spoilers ahead

Tyler Perry’s Temptation is a so-called “erotic thriller,” which explores what happens when a married woman pursues an extramarital affair. The main character, Judith (played by Jurnee Smollett-Bell), is a small-town girl who moves to Washington, D.C., with her childhood-sweetheart-turned-husband, Brice (played by Lance Gross). Six years into their marriage, Judith grows restless and feels unappreciated, bored with Brice’s 10-year-plan and annoyed that he’s been too aloof to remember her birthday.

Enter Harley, a wealthy — like, really really really wealthy — social media entrepreneur, who’s looking to invest in the matchmaking service where Judith works. Glances are exchanged, banter is traded, pickup lines are dropped, and it’s not too long be Judith is resisting-but-not-really-resisting Harley’s advances.

Eventually, Judith leaves Brice at home to gallivant around town at black-light parties and snort coke with Harley. (Because that’s what women do when they have affairs with rich men. They go to black-light parties and snort coke.)

But let me fast-forward and tell you how this story ends. Brice, upset that his wife has left him, seeks solace in his friend Melinda (played by Brandy Norwood). Melinda’s been on the run from a stalking ex (who we easily figure out is Harley), and Brice asks her if she thinks she’ll ever find love again. There’s an awkward pause, and then Melinda reveals she’s HIV-positive. “So no,” she concludes. She will not find love again. Because in Tyler Perry’s world, people living with HIV are doomed to live a life of lovelessness and solitude.

When Melinda shares that Harley is the ex who gave her HIV, Brice panics. Suddenly, he must save Judith. Judith must be saved from the HIV! Brice races to Harley’s apartment, finds Judith beaten up and left in a bathtub, and carries her home (not without throwing Harley through a window and punching him a few times).

The future isn’t so bright

For a moment, there’s a glimmer of hope — maybe the broken couple will reunite through this trauma, maybe Brice’s undying love for Judith will heal her battered face and gloss over her bad decisions, and maybe the pair will settle into married bliss once again. Except…

Tyler Perry catapults us an indeterminate number of years into the future, showing a hobbled, bespectacled and homely Judith limping to Brice’s pharmacy to get her HIV medication. As she’s leaving, we meet Brice’s new (unsettlingly-younger) wife and young son, a picture-perfect snapshot of what Judith could have had, had she not messed around and gotten the HIV.

We’re left with a shot of Judith walking away, “to church” she says, hobbling down a nondescript sidewalk in D.C.

It’s all entirely too insulting.

The vilification of women and HIV victims

I could spend days talking about the way Tyler Perry vilifies and punishes women with any speck of ambition, education or sexual desire in his movies (and I have).

But the “shocker” HIV storyline in “Temptation” was egregiously repulsive, implying that people who live with HIV (as over one million people in the U.S. do) are either a) being punished for some sort of iniquity, and/or b) will live a loveless, lonely life of despair and regret.

The worst part is that Temptation treats Judith’s HIV infection as a modern-day version of leprosy, and presents her hobbling with the disease as a reasonable resolution to the story, a justified sealing of her fate. Note that Brice remains uninfected, and that Harley simply vanishes, presumably flying away in his jet to infect another unsuspecting young woman.

Perry’s message is targeted specifically at black women — live the way a good little Christian girl should, or be eternally damned with disease.

I can’t say it enough. It’s insulting.

A mentality that’s stuck in the 90s

For one, Perry seem stuck in the mid-1990s, when HIV truly was a death sentence for those who were infected, before medical technology advanced to its current state.

The film also implies that an HIV diagnosis means there’s no longer a need to dress fashionably, appear attractive or embody any kind of joy. It sounds superficial on the surface, but look at the contrast — pre-HIV Judith was lively and passionate, with long flowing hair, a stylish wardrobe and an impish glint in her eye.

But after being diagnosed, Judith is transformed into a homely “church lady,” hair pulled back, glasses too large for her face, her entire body swallowed by a large, drab grey overcoat.

The implication: Women with HIV lose all desire (or any need) to look and feel like women.

HIV is not a ‘boogeyman disease’

In Perry’s world, Judith’s new life apparently only involves church, picking up medication, and advising other young married women not to make her mistakes. This flies in the face of the reality of many HIV patients who document their live full, exciting lives in support communities such as TheBody.com, and those who continue tireless work as awareness advocates.

Perry’s use of HIV as a moralistic plot device undercuts the decades-long effort remove the stigma of the virus. And seeing how African-Americans, by far, are disproportionately affected by HIV, it’s arguably irresponsible for Perry — a filmmaker known for his influence with African-Americans audiences — to continue to portray HIV as a life-ending “boogeyman disease” that only affects “bad” or deserving people. I can only imagine how insulting Perry’s treatment is to HIV awareness warriors like Marvelyn Brown, Rae Lewis-Thornton, and Hydeia Broadbent.

Countless other stars and luminaries in the black community — Alicia Keys, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Blair Underwood and Magic Johnson, among others — have worked for years to increase awareness and education and provide support for HIV patients.

They understand its impact on black Americans, and they’ve used their platforms to advance the conversation about the virus, not to stifle it. It’s high time for Tyler Perry to catch up.

Meet the sistas who Motivate and Inspire with their words Three local and upcoming women writers/authors have joined forces to write a thought provoking book based on their own real life experiences and reflections. Called “Sista Speak…Speak Lord!,” The three authors: Sonya Bowman, Zelda Corona and T.R. Pulley say the book provides wisdom and forethought for all audiences. The book is now in the process of having the book published sometime in the very near future. Below are their bios and samples of their individual work.Zelda Corona – A high spirited and energetic individual who brings enormous vision and enthusiasm to any endeavor. As an Activator, she definitely makes things happen. Her passion is to inspire others to see beyond their grasp and reach for the unattainable through faith and favor. Zelda holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Health Care Administration and an MBA with an emphasis in Corporate Communication. She is the founder of a mentorship alliance, “Victory Vision Life Coaching,” where she utilizes her motivational talents to uplift individuals and help them define their personal and career path. As a mentor, she encourages many through her own life experiences and challenges, and as an Adjunct Instructor for Concordia University, she makes it her mission to teach the total person regardless of the subject matter. You will find Zelda’s prose to be truthful and stimulating, illustrating examples of how she has taken 100% responsibility for her life by refusing to be a victim of any circumstance.

Sonya Bowman – “Maryam” came into this world in 1967 in Illinois, right outside of Chicago. Sonya has powerful faith based ethics instilled in her by her father Abdul-Muhammad, who started the multi-cultural center at UWM. Sonya is a motivator who leads by example, settling for nothing less than bringing visions to fruition. Sonya graduated from Concordia University with a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration and is currently in completion of her MBA with a concentration in Health Care Administration. Sonya is a Lead Specialist with the Crisis Prevention Institute, and an avid supporter of community charitable events and committees. Giving back and paying it forward to the needy, disabled shut-ins, and those newly released from prison, is paramount for her. Sonya’s writing has enabled her to collaborate with her co-authors and others within the community – helping to open doors and find inner peace as it relates to keeping God first. As a true soldier of life’s trials and test, she is proud to have been raised with the necessary ingredients of – truth, courage, survival and the respect of self! It is these traits that have been her steadfast companions on her journey.

Tara R. Pulley – A take charge individual who accepts no prisoners. Tara’s unique approach is uncoated and direct, but her ability to put herself in the shoes of others depicts why she sits on the Board of the Convergence Resource Center for Women and her career choice of providing employment for those on community corrections. As an excellent communicator, Ms. Pulley brings realism and clarity to her writing which clearly lets her truths sign.

Some women still believe that heart disease is more of a man-killer, it’s not.

A stressed-out, chain-smoking man who eats crappy food and is inundated with work—that is how many women envision heart attack candidates. And although it is true that the prevalence of coronary artery disease among women is lower before menopause, ladies’ risk rise after they go through this change of life.

As women approach age 75, their risk of CAD becomes equal to that of men. What’s more, CAD is the leading cause of women’s death and disability after menopause. The risk factors for women developing CAD are the same as in men: high blood pressure, increased blood cholesterol,diabetes, a family history of CAD at a young age and smoking cigarettes.

According to the American Heart Association, heart disease is still the No. 1 killer of women. But the good news is that it’s preventable. The tips they offer to women are simple:

• Quit smoking. Just one year after you quit, you can cut your risk of CAD by 50 percent.

• Start an exercise program. Just a 30-minute walk each day can take you miles away from the risk of heart attack and stroke.

• Modify your eating habits. For example, use lower-fat or no-fat ingredients. These healthy substitutions can help you cut down on saturated fats, trans fats and cholesterol without forcing you to give up the delicious foods you love. Also, reach for healthier snacks and opt for smarter food preparation methods (think baked instead of fried).